By Brie Watson, Ottawa Citizen, April 25, 2017
A group of friends and I were waiting in a shawarma shop on Rideau on a night back in January. I was visiting Ottawa, a city I once called home. One of my friends, Artrude, had scheduled a pick-up with OC Transpo’s Para Transpo services for 10 p.m. The time rolled around and the bus was nowhere in sight.
“I can’t call for a half hour,” Artrude told us.
So we all waited, late on a cold night, in downtown Ottawa.
The system currently in place is such that a disabled person cannot call OC Transpo to ask about the whereabouts of their scheduled pick-up until a half-hour has passed from the initial scheduled timing. Luckily, we had ordered a shawarma, so it technically wasn’t considered loitering, as we sat around for an additional 30 minutes. We didn’t leave the restaurant because we didn’t want to leave Artrude alone downtown at night.
http://ottawacitizen.com/opinion/columnists/brie-watson-heres-how-to-improve-para-transpo